Friday, March 17, 2017

‘Twas a sad, sad day; can we just hide under the covers for a little bit longer?

President
Donald J. Trump has given us the first federal budget proposal of his term, and
it truly is sad.

TRUMP: Our source of national gloom and doom

To
come up with more military spending (maybe he really wants to be a “wartime”
president because he figures that’s the only way the country will unite behind
him) out of the $1.1 trillion available, he has made many cuts – particularly to
anything related to the environment.

SUCH
AS THE demolition of the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative – a project whose
purpose is to preserve the continued use of Lake Michigan and its sister Great
Lakes as the largest fresh water system in the world.

Then
again, maybe the Trumpites are figuring the Great Lakes are already gone, on
account of those dreaded Asian Carp being on the verge of entering the lakes
and mucking up its natural ecosystem.

There
also were the cuts to the National Endowment of the Arts and the National
Endowment of the Humanities – although conservative ideologues whose idea of “art”
doesn’t extend beyond a painting of yellow daisies have been ranting on this
area for so long it would have been a miracle if Trump hadn’t done something
silly.

As
a Washington Post report contended, the $54 billion proposed increase in
defense spending for federal fiscal 2018 could have funded both arts agencies
for the next 183 years. Or perhaps kept a few more of the 2.4 million elderly individuals who have to rely on Meals on Wheels workers to bring them food because they can't really cook for themselves any longer. While Chicago-area educators could be heard grousing about the 18 percent cut in funding for federal education programs -- which when combined with the delays due to a lack of a state budget will result in some serious funding issues for public schools.

NOT
THAT THIS was the only negative news we had to endure Thursday.

MADIGAN: Telling us how bad healthcare is

Down
in Springfield, an Illinois House appropriations subcommittee held hearings
whose purpose was to tell us just how much the Trump-inspired American Health
Care Act will wind up costing Illinois and harming our residents.

Many
of whom are able to get medical coverage under the Affordable Care Act but that
Republicans are all eager to repeal because, after all, it was the idea of the
former president, Barack Obama.

A
plan whose fate in Congress is uncertain because even many of the GOPers who
openly boast of wanting to dump Obama don’t want their names being attached to
this stinker.

RAUNER: We don't like him any better than Mike

EVEN
OUR STATE’S Republican excuse of a governor, Bruce Rauner, is reluctant to come out in
favor of it, and Rep. Peter Roskam, R-Ill., the most prominent Chicago-area
GOPer in Congress, speaks against it.

Considering
that Rauner has an approval rating of 31 percent (barely better than Illinois
House Speaker Michael Madigan’s rating of 28 percent, according to a study from
Southern Illinois University), the man doesn’t need to do anything to dig
himself any deeper.

The
man still has dreams of winning himself re-election in 2018, and now the
billionaire J.B. Pritzker has started kicking in his own money for an
exploratory committee to see if people would actually vote for him over Rauner.

All
in all, it was one of those days where we’re better off if we keep ourselves
clueless as to the happenings of the news. The only problem is that those
happenings take place even if we try to ignore them.

AS
IT TURNS out, even the ideologues amongst us are feeling peeved – there’s that
judge in Hawaii who struck down Trump’s second attempt at imposing a ban on
certain foreigners who might have desires to travel to the United States. They’re
already spewing the nonsense that Judge Derrick Watson in Honolulu consulted
with Obama just prior to issuing his ruling. We’ll have to endure their
paranoia.

Which
means our only chance of self-preservation is to keep ourselves informed. There
might be one group that benefits – psychiatrists, if we all wind up having to
go for therapy to help us cope with the chaotic times our society now faces.

So
on this gloomy day, I can’t help but think this lesser-known recording of Chuck
Berry somehow captures the spirit of sadness we’re feeling.

I am a Chicago-area freelance writer who has reported on various political and legal beats. I wrote "Hispanic" issues columns for United Press International, observed up close the Statehouse Scene in Springfield, Ill., the Cook County Board in Chicago and municipal government in places like Calumet City, Ill., and Gary, Ind. For a time, I also wrote about agriculture. Trust me when I say the symbolic stench of partisan politics (particularly when directed against people due to their ethnicity) is far nastier than any odor that could come from a farm animal.